Only For a Moment
by Diemerald
Summary: Sometimes it's just good to hear a friend's voice.


Feverishly, I scribbled note after note by the flickering light of my desk lamp. Ideas, thoughts, theories, everything was compiled in there for future reference. I didn't have time to think about other things, not when there was more to know! Just this week I learned that some Pokémon evolve when exposed to a certain geographical location. I certainly wasn't letting something as inconsequential as sleep stop me from researching this, at least not a little bit more. Practically the entire page was filled with notes or diagrams, including the margins- I often stopped caring about aesthetics when I got really involved like this. I glanced back at the report made by some professor in a far-off region- the name didn't matter, just the results- and I put down a few quick hypotheses on what kinds of Pokémon this effected, and why. I remembered my current number of owned Pokémon- 382, good but not great- and it motivated me to write faster, think faster. A theory came to my head, and I scratched it down in haste: "Some Pokémon appear to be stimulated when their environment matches with their biological material, meaning that- probably, at least-"

That's when my phone rang, breaking me out of my trance. I looked at the clock, annoyed- 3:03 am. It buzzed incessantly like an angry Beedrill, demanding to be heard. "No way am I answering this late at night," I said to myself. Then I saw who was calling. I picked up immediately.

"Shauna! Hi!" I exclaimed into the phone, not bothering to hide my enthusiasm.

"Hey, Trevor" said the decidedly tentative voice on the other end of the phone. "Did I interrupt you?"

I laughed to myself a bit. She knows me too well. "Uhh, no," I said as smoothly as I could (not very). I could tell she didn't buy it, but that didn't really matter. "So, uhhh…" I floundered, trying to put in words any of the many things I wanted to say to her. "What's up?"

"I just, uhh… how's everyone doing?" she asked with false cheer in her voice. "Everyone holding up okay without me?" If I knew her half as well as I thought I did, I could tell that that she wasn't telling me everything about why she'd called.

I paused for a beat. Then: "you're not fooling anyone, Shauna."

"I had a feeling you'd say that," she said, this time with genuine cheer, and I felt us both relax slightly. She continued, after a bit of silence: "…I really miss everyone," she finally admitted.

The words hung in the air like a small sigh on a cold day. My suspicions- well, at least some of them- were confirmed. She had put on a brave face when she left alone on her new adventure, yes, but I knew that she'd miss us.

Of course, if I had also hoped for her to say something else, something to me specifically, that was of no consequence.

"It's just…" she continued slowly at my lack of response, "I know everyone was busy with their own things, I know that." I remembered that day: "Of course it's fine you can't go! I'll be perfectly fine on my own, y'know!" That false confidence contrasting the side I knew was there from the start. "I just wish someone was here with me…" she continued, trailing off.

I decided it would be a good time to speak up. But what to say? What to say to the girl who's the picture of self-reliance in her one hour of need? The girl who was just fine with who she was, even if that meant not having a specific ambition like the rest of our group? To the one who always threw a curveball, always something unexpected, just when I thought I had her figured out? How could I tell her that I wanted to be there just as much as she wanted everyone there?

"Okay, hold on," I said, still trying to formulate full sentences suitable for conversation. "You'll see us soon enough! What brought this on, huh? You hadn't even called since you left…"

"I thought I could do it myself, Trevor," she said calmly with only the slightest hint of discomposure. "I thought a journey by myself would be a great experience! New sights, new people… but it feels empty without you guys. We built our memories together. These memories I'm making… they don't feel right without all of you in them."

This time, I knew exactly what to say, no questions asked: "Come home, Shauna."

"I can't. Coming home means admitting I failed."

"And what's wrong with that?"

"Calem. He'd never accept me if I gave up partway through."

The worst part was, she had a fair point. I love the guy, but Calem is even more competitive than Serena, and he likes his friends to excel as well. Our resident hothead would be at least a little shocked if she came back empty-handed, considering what a show she made of leaving independently from the rest of the group. I didn't care though, that shouldn't have to be important and I told her as much, speaking much more openly than I would with most: "Who cares about him? You shouldn't be moving exclusively to cater to your friends' wants!"

"I know, I know," she said as her voice slipped into exasperation and her words gained in tempo. "But I can't help it! I want more than anything to share memories with the people I care about. What if- what if they don't want to do the same with me?"

"No one wants that, and you know it," I said somewhat accusingly, knowing that she wouldn't really think we'd give up on her that easily and preferring in this instance to get straight to the point. "We're always happy to have you. _I'm_ always happy to have you. And there's no way you're getting out of this group just like that."

There was a long pause on the opposite end of the line. Shauna was clearly caught off-guard by my little outburst, which was admittedly outside of my norm. After things had calmed down a little bit, I broke the silence. "Alright, just… tell me more. I'm sure you have a reason for calling at exactly this time, to exactly this person." I questioned her in as light a tone as I could manage, hoping it would help her respond more openly.

"I was thinking," she responded, quickly and definitively. "I thought about how everyone else had some unique thing to bring to the table. I wondered if maybe you all let me go alone not because you were busy but because you thought I wasn't worth it. It's stupid, right? I'm perfectly sure I'm just overthinking things. At least, that's what my rational side says. But I still just can't get those thoughts out of my head…" Her words, to my relief, didn't contain much of a negative inflection. She was always very good at saying what she wanted to say without letting her emotional state effect her (something I'd always admired about her, though of course that minor detail bears little relevance).

I interrupted her long string of thought to say what I could. "It's alright, Shauna. I understand what you're going through. Actually, it feels a bit similar to my own thoughts not too long ago." Not something I liked to admit, but it was true that I had been feeling a bit envious of my friends as of late.

Upon hearing that, her voice gained back a just a little of its former lilt, beginning to cross that fine line between controlled and genuine, and she giggled a bit before continuing. "I knew you'd understand, Trevor. I just knew it. I made exactly the right choice, calling you."

I smiled to myself of course, happy that I was her first choice. I loved that I, above everyone else, was the one that could make a difference. Really, I just really enjoyed feeling like I mattered to someone. It was incredibly validating, _she_ was incredibly validating. More than anyone else, she made me feel important. "Shauna, Shauna, Shauna," I shook my head and kept smiling my secret smile. Then, with bravado and self-confidence I very rarely display: "there never should have been any doubt."

"Alright, Trevor," she said in a voice that almost curled into a laugh at how unusual my words were for me. "I'll keep that in mind. Anyway, enough about me for a second, I want to get my mind off of things anyway. How have you been doing?"

It hadn't even occurred to me that I myself might end up being a point of conversation. "Umm… I've been fine. Mostly researching." I glanced at the field of scattered notes around my desk and found them to be several hundred times less appealing than before this call started. _Mostly missing you,_ I announced to any and all who had the notion to listen in on my thoughts. "It's hard just to even get everyone together for lunch without everyone here." _Please come back, I want you back here right now._ It was pretty obvious to everyone that the group wasn't the same without Shauna, after all. "Oh, and I think you can tell I've been staying up far later than I should be." _Which I would be more than happy to continue doing in your company._

She finally interrupted me from my silly little reverie. It was for the best, probably. "Yeah, well. I'm not necessarily exercising the best judgment in sleeping, either. In any case, I'm glad you're progressing in what you want to do, at least!"

It was funny, having such thoughts without any impact on the other party. The conversation continued as though they had never happened, and things would always continue as such unless I did something about it. These little slivers of thought- seeming like such a natural evolution of my thoughts but carrying so much weight outside of them- needed to be let out eventually. I fully realized the fact at the time just as I fully realize it now- but it was up to me to decide when, and while the prospect was enticing, exciting, I wasn't ready to let them go yet. Quietly, I decided to hold onto them a little longer.

Instead, I decided to continue the conversation at hand, as if there had been no internal interruption. "It's always interesting, I suppose," I trailed off for a moment, realizing the irony of the statement. "So, uhh…" I wasn't sure where to go next. "You know my suggestion, but what are you going to do now?"

She took a while to respond. Then, simply: "I don't know. Things don't always have a straight answer right away, you know?"

I did know. It's something anyone can relate too, after all. If there's one thing I've learned in my vaguely scientific searches for the truth, it's that no one has all the answers. And yet that doesn't stop us from trying.

"Alright, take some time to decide then," I said with an almost audible shrug, and her silence made me even more determined to show her that her thoughts were entirely valid. "Look, this sort of thing happens to everyone. It'll pass, just like everything passes." I said this with the intention and hope of being convincing in my argument, though it might've come out more flippant than I had intended.

More sighing from the other end of the phone informed me that, despite what I might've hoped, I was not a one-stop shop problem solution. I did what I could, at least. "It's not that simple, Trevor," she said with a certain bite in her voice. I knew I shouldn't take it personally, but somehow that didn't stop me.

More silence, more pauses, more things thought and left unsaid. To my surprise, she broke it with a reluctant apology: "…I'm sorry, Trevor. I know you're trying to help. It's just a really vexing problem for me."

"Shauna, hey…" I began, a simple prologue to a simple observation. "I've been thinking."

I had thought about everything she said. Tried to think of an easy way out of an identity crisis, even. But things aren't as black and white as we'd like to think they are. If they were, if I could have solved the situation in my ideal way, Shauna would be beside me right now, as I write this. But as much as I wanted that reality, I was beginning to realize that some things can be the opposite of what they appear to be. And I had to tell her.

"I think you might need some time away. From us. It… seems like the way you compare yourself to us isn't really getting you anywhere. Only you can figure out what you want to do with your life. Please don't let us stop you from finding it for yourself. And don't let your memories of us stop you from making new memories!"

"Wow, I…" and it was her that trailed off this time. "I guess you may have a point. I have been letting that keep me from experiencing things on my own."

"Exactly! It's your turn to be exactly who you want to be, without standing in anyone's shadow."

Of course, I couldn't know what she looked like just then, and I doubt I'll ever know. But I'd like to think she was smiling.

"Alright!" she spoke with more self-assurance than at any other point in the call, that's for sure. "I think I might just take your advice. So… this might be the last time you hear from me in a while. Take care of the others for me, yeah?"

Last word, last chance. If there was anything else to be said, it would have been wise to say it then. And maybe there was something else to be said. Maybe at another time, in another life. But at that moment, I knew we were both smiling. The answer, both the end to the sentence and the prelude to a new paragraph: "Yeah."

I hung up my phone, and the room was filled with familiar silence.


End file.
